Oswaldo Vigas

Oswaldo Vigas (August 4, 1923 – April 22, 2014)^[1] was a Venezuelan artist who worked as a painter, muralist, and sculptor.^[2][3][4] His body of work encompassed paintings, prints, drawings, ceramics, and tapestries.^[5] He integrated pre-Columbian with modernist and contemporary artistic currents. He lived and worked in France and Venezuela.^[6]

Oswaldo Vigas was born on August 4, 1923 in Valencia, Carabobo, Venezuela.^[7] He identified as mestizo, reflecting mixed Indigenous and Spanish ancestry.^[7] After the death of his father, Vigas started painting and learned how to paint the human body at the age of 12.^[8]

He studied medicine at the University of the Andes (Spanish: Universidad de los Andes) in Mérida, Venezuela and the Central University of Venezuela (Spanish: Universidad Central de Venezuela) in Caracas. He earned his medical degree in 1951.^[9] While studying, he took art classes at the Taller Libre de Artes and the Escuela de Artes Plásticas Cristóbal Rojas. During this time, Vigas became acquainted with painters including Manuel Cabré and Pedro Ángel González.

Vigas enrolled at the École des Beaux-Arts in 1953, where he studied etching under Marcel Jaudon and lithography under Stanley William Hayter.^[10]

Vigas' early paintings focused on the female form, and he often returned to the theme of witches (brujas) throughout his career. He also became interested in pre-Columbian culture and pottery, specifically Venus de Tacarigua figurines.^[7][9]

Vigas's witch paintings were awarded three art prizes in Venezuela.^[8] He won the National Visual Arts Award in 1952 for his painting La gran bruja (1951) and had a solo exhibition at the Museo de Bellas Artes in Caracas.^[7][9] Following this recognition, Vigas moved to Paris in 1952.^[7][8]

Vigas lived in Paris for twelve years, where he met his wife Janine and was associated with Fernand Léger, Max Ernst, and Wifredo Lam.^[8]

During most of the 1950s, his work shifted away from the human figure and toward constructivism and abstraction. Between 1953 and 1958, Vigas exhibited regularly in France and Venezuela.

In 1953, he participated in the São Paulo Biennial and in a group show at the Musée d’Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris, among other exhibitions. He also received a commission for five mosaic murals at the Universidad Central de Venezuela, which was designated a World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 2000.^[11][12]

In 1954, he was the first artist to represent Venezuela at the XXVII Venice Biennale.^[13][14] In the same year, he was part of the Painters of Venezuela traveling exhibition at the Pan-American Union,^[15][16] organised by the Museo de Bellas Artes.^[17]

During the late 1950s to mid-1960s, while still in France, Vigas was invited to participate in a survey of Latin American art in which he received first prize: the Gulf-Caribbean Art Exhibition, curated by Lee Malone at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston.

Vigas also had exhibitions at the Slater Memorial Museum of Norwich, Connecticut and the University of Nebraska Art Gallery, and participated in the Contemporary Drawings from Latin America exhibition at the Pan-American Union in Washington, D.C. He was included in another large survey exhibition, South American Art Today, curated by José Gómez Sicre at the Dallas Museum of Fine Art.

After visiting Pablo Picasso in 1955, features commonly found in pre-Columbian art, particularly stylized faces, began to appear in Vigas’s paintings. While Vigas drew inspiration from Picasso, his son Lorenzo has stated he did not seek closer ties with the artist.^[18]

During the 1950s, Vigas became interested in anthropology and the early cultures of the Americas. He developed a personal approach that combined gestural, geometric and figurative work. He later looked to early cultures as a way to explore personal identity, using symbols and imagery drawn from nature and myth, which is shown in his work from the 1960s onward.

In 1964, he moved back to Valencia, Venezuela and continued to exhibit his work throughout the country. In 1967, his son Lorenzo was born, and in 1970, he relocated to Caracas.

During the early 1960s, Vigas explored informalism, using thick black lines to portray the figure through abstract volumes and shapes. Upon his return to Venezuela, he was named Cultural Director of the Universidad de Los Andes (ULA) in Mérida and simultaneously appointed Artistic Director of the Instituto Nacional de Cultura y Bellas Artes (INCIBA) in Caracas. INCIBA was part of the Ministry of Education of Venezuela and replaced by the Comisión Organizadora del Consejo Nacional de la Cultura (CONAC) in 1974. In his roles as Cultural Director and Artistic Director, Vigas promoted the creation of national salons and awards to help Venezuelan artists. He held both positions until 1972.

From the mid-1960s onwards, Vigas' work progressively shifted from informalism to a new figurative phase.

During the 1980s, Vigas produced a series of tapestries and ceramic works, as well as his first bronze-cast sculptures.

In 1990, the Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Caracas Sofía Imber organised a major retrospective of his works, showcasing paintings, sculptures, tapestries, ceramics and jewellery.

In 1992, the city of Monte Carlo honoured him with the Prince Rainier Grand Prize, and the Monnaie de Paris organised a retrospective from 1952 to 1993 showcasing one hundred and thirty-two works comprising paintings, ceramics and sculptures.

In 2008, he was designated Commandeur de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres de France.

During his later years, Vigas continued to work and exhibit worldwide. In 2012, he was invited to participate in the ''Un Coeur, un Monde'' group show that travelled through France, the United States, Vietnam, Australia, Brazil and Japan. He was also invited to exhibit at the ''Latin American & Caribbean Contemporary Art Today'' survey at the Miura Museum of Art, Tokyo.

Vigas died on April 22, 2014, in Caracas, at the age of 90.^[19] He was survived by his wife, Janine Vigas, and their son filmmaker Lorenzo.^[19] His son, the filmmaker Lorenzo Vigas, won the Golden Lion for best film of the 2015 Venice Film Festival with his first feature film, From Afar.

Lagoven, the oil company and subsidiary of PDVSA, produced a documentary film about his work in 2016.^[20]

The Oswaldo Vigas Foundation (Fundación Oswaldo Vigas) was created to expand his art legacy worldwide.^[21] A retrospective Oswaldo Vigas Antológica: 1943–2013 premiered at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Lima,^[8] before traveling to the National Museum of Fine Arts, Santiago, and subsequently to Museo de Arte Moderno, Bogotá in July 2015.^[21]

Vigas received a Doctor Honoris Causa degree from the Universidad de Los Andes in 1999, and from the Universidad Gran Mariscal de Ayacucho (UGMA), in Barcelona, Venezuela.

Vigas received the International Association of Art Critics Award twice, in 2008 and 2014. In 2004, he received the Latin Union Award in Washington, DC.^[22]

A major retrospective of Vigas' work travelled throughout the Americas. The first instalment of Oswaldo Vigas Anthological: 1943- 2013 was held at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Lima, Peru; the show then travelled to the National Museum of Fine Arts in Santiago, Chile, and it will open in Bogotá, Colombia, in July 2015.^[9][23]

This is a listing of select exhibitions of Vigas.

• Oswaldo Vigas: antológica 1943 - 2013 (Exhibition catalog). Venezuela: Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes. 2015. ISBN 9789807690003.
• Oswaldo Vigas, Sortilèges des Tropiques: peintures, tapisseries, sculptures, céramiques 1950-2005 [Oswaldo Vigas, Charm of the Tropics: paintings, tapestries, sculptures, ceramics 1950 – 2005] (Exhibition catalog). Angers, France: Musée Jean Lurçat et de la Tapisserie Contemporaine. 2005. ISBN 9782901287902.
• Oswaldo Vigas: ideografías de París, 1952-1957 (Exhibition catalog). Caracas, Venezuela: Embajada de Francia in Venezuela, Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Caracas, Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Caracas Sofía Imber. 2002. ISBN 9789802722266.